A Shared Lanuage
by sitabethel
Summary: This story takes place during the six months Kurogane and Fay were stuck without Mokona to act as a translator.


The first time they were separated from the others, Kurogane wasn't concerned because he and Fay could still communicate, which meant the little meat bun was near by. Later, however, when the sky of Shara Country opened up and they were sucked into the next world, Fay's words strung together as bits of useless sound. All they could do was look for their friends, and trust everyone was still in the same world. As they searched for their missing travel companions, Kurogane realized that, although he couldn't speak with Fay, he could understand the language of the Yasha Clan. Differences in their dialects made speaking awkward, but to them Kurogane sounded like a foreigner with an accent and not a traveler from another world. He arranged to fight as a mercenary for the Yasha Clan's army. The deal not only gave he and Fay a means to shelter and support themselves, but it would allow them to gather information as they searched for the others or Sakura's feather.

Kurogane enjoyed the first night with amiable silence stretching out between he and Fay. The two men tried to play a card game, but Kurogane forgot the rules and couldn't ask Fay for directions which forced them to abandon the cards and sit and drink sake.

By the third evening, Fay grew restless, drinking and pacing along the length of their room. Kurogane watched him and smiled into his cup, still appreciating the quite.

Six days later even Kurogane was bored, although he'd never admit he missed conversing with Fay, who mumble to himself, speaking at the window and the dark night sky beyond the glass pane. Fay walked around the room, patting items and repeating the word for them over and over. Kurogane imagined what it'd sound like if he understood, chair, chair, chair, wall, wall, wall, pillow, pillow, pillow, Fay's language was soft and melodic, but it was not the language of another country one that Kurogane could try to puzzle together, it was the language of another dimension and beyond his mind's grasp. "It's no good," Kurogane growled despite himself, knowing his words were as useless and Fay's.

The next evening, the seventh, Fay smiled and poured Kurogane a warmed dish of sake. Kurogane nodded and drank. Fay spoke to him, eyes intent and searching for something, but Kurogane couldn't understand. He opened his mouth to protest but Fay press a pale finger tight against his lips, silencing him, while continuing to perform his soliloquy, Kurogane the sole audience.

He watched Fay's lips move with the incomprehensible words, entranced by the shapes his mouth made, tongue dancing behind his teeth. Kurogane's fingers twitched as he almost reached out to touch Fay's lips, but then he realized what he was doing and scowled, eyebrows knitting together in a thick line. Kurogane exhaled through his nose, ready to slap Fay's hand away from his mouth, but before he could, Fay's lips were against his. Kurogane pressed his hands into Fay's shoulders, intending to push him away, but his fingers worked on their own, curling into the fabric of Fay's shirt and pulling the two men closer together.

His mind tried to piece together what he was both doing and wanting to do, but his desires were as beyond his thought process as Fay's words. Fay tugged at the buttons on Kurogane's shirt and instead of gripping Fay's wrist and pulling his hands away, Kurogane mimicked the action, stripping cloth away from Fay's body until only soft, milk-pale skin covered him. He crawled into Fay's lap, all the while their mouths sucking in one another's breaths as their tongues battled for territory. Fay glided his thin fingers along the inside of Kurogane's thighs, causing the muscles to bunch into tight knots. With his left hand, Fay fumbled through the discarded clothing and searched the pockets until his hand withdrew with a small, glass bottle. He used his thumb to pop the cork in the bottle and pour a clear oil into his right hand. Again he massaged the insides of both Kurogane's thighs, sliding his hand higher to Kurogane's ass. The surprise of Fay's fingers slipping inside Kurogane caused him to break their chain of kisses and bit down hard into Fay's neck. Fay only purred at the rough treatment, adding another finger. Kurogane forced his teeth deeper into Fay's skin, sucking and biting.

Then Fay was inside him and there was pressure, and movement and burning and yes, yes, Fay yes, but he didn't say the words. His words would be needless noise pouring from his mouth and he had nothing to say that he couldn't express with his fingers clutching at Fay's shoulder blades, with his hips bucking forward, or with his breath clogging his throat and his tried to drag air into his lungs.

Afterwards Fay rested beside him, tracing invisible symbols on Kurogane's chest. Fay's eyes, jet black since they landed in the country of the Yasha Clan, stared in the direction of Kurogane's chest, but he wasn't looking at Kurogane's body. The sadness tracing each line and contour in Fay's face expressed more than Kurogane could have gathered from questioning the other man verbally. Kurogane brushed his pointer finger along Fay's jawline and to his chin. Kurogane lifted Fay's face so that their eyes met. Fay understood his unspoken question, answering with a wedge of smile that, for perhaps the first time since Kurogane met him, wasn't hiding something. A simple translation, Fay was content with the present moment. The mourning in Fay's previous expression, then, was a result of past memories, events that he wouldn't speak of even if Kurogane knew the words to ask about them.

Kurogane thought about the conversations they had when they could communicate, Fay hiding behind a feigned smile and avoiding Kurogane's questions, but the light pressure of his fingertip against Kurogane's chest was sincere. The muted exhale of satisfaction that snuck from Fay's lips as he drifted to sleep was also real. Kurogane himself preferred expressing emotions through action instead of speech. If you hated your enemies you struck them with a sword. If you loved someone you protected them. So Kurogane understood that actions suited them better, a shared language both men understood.


End file.
